Mayfly Architecture

Author: Deng Kunyan
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-07-01
Features: Perhaps due to personal disposition, I am reluctant to be attached to this external illusion. Additionally, my mentor repeatedly warned me not to publish these valueless works prematurely. Therefore, I have always politely declined invitations from publishers on both sides of the strait, refusing to release what are termed personal anthologies or biographies. However, as days pass, materials gradually disappear for unknown reasons, and I worry about my memory declining with age. Coupled with persistent persuasion from my friend Ren Ding, who is involved in publishing in Shanghai, I reluctantly agreed to treat this as a phase of personal documentation and to seek approval from East China Normal University for publication. This decision even led to a scolding from my mentor, who said I should focus on important matters instead of getting involved in this. It’s indeed unjust. If I don’t agree, what can publishers do to me? If I don’t insist, what then?
As for those who frequently ask me for materials, I am truly sorry. From now on, they will have to buy these books themselves. It’s embarrassing to say, but apart from handing over materials and participating in interviews, I haven’t been actively involved in the process. By the time the initial drafts of the graphic design reached me, it was already three days before they were sent to the printing factory. Despite being known as someone who is always critical, I have lost the right and opportunity to interfere in my own publication. Yet, I was forced to write this preface in just one day. This is also the reason I insisted on not publishing these disorganized personal growth materials, which my mentor, Han Bao De, believes are not my best achievements, to avoid regretting it later. Now, I am already regretting it.
Psychologically, however, I am deeply grateful to Ren Ding for his concern and effort. This is indeed not an easy task. I am considered by others as a multifaceted worker who participates in everything, which is why I have accumulated so much material over half my life. Perhaps I believed that by the end of my life, I would have achieved something significant, so I made every effort to preserve these materials. I owe my gratitude to Ren Ding and his team members, including Fei Gao and Huo Tan, as well as the young friends I haven’t met yet. Thank you!
Of course, I must also admire and appreciate the courage of East China Normal University Press for accepting this. If one truly reads through the texts in these materials, they will realize that these results-driven manifestations are all projects invited or commissioned by external circumstances. Professional design work, writing—everything in these collections was done by outsiders. I was merely an involuntary symbiotic participant, fully aware of my role, yet external circumstances came and attributed these works to me, misleading readers. I never had the chance to clarify this, perhaps because life is like this. Otherwise, how would there be the saying that a true friend is hard to find in life?
I have always been fortunate, and I believe there will come a day when, apart from my mentor, there will be Chinese people who understand me—just like the foreigners who praise me to the point of my feeling ashamed. Then, there might be a chance for me to present my architectural vision to my mentor. In my personal standards, my architectural vision has long taken shape in my life, but others simply fail to understand it. Otherwise, how would I have accumulated so many external accolades? So, I no longer care about this vision myself. Let others say what they will—laugh or criticize as they please. After all, I remain who I am: I think, I speak, I act, and thus I exist, as if in a place where no one else is.
Publishing this collection of personal materials, what I truly want to clarify is that outsiders think everything I do is lively and dazzling, as if I am someone who chooses the path of least resistance. In reality, I consider myself a quiet person like still water, but others simply cannot see it. Must I shave my head and eat vegetarian food?!
Having left the fame and fortune of Taipei and moved to Shanghai, it has already been sixteen years. I have worked tirelessly, yet I have been repeatedly rejected by the Chinese. I also feel as though I have achieved nothing. Now, my hair is thinning, my teeth are loose, and my body is aging. I sigh, feeling too ashamed to return home, even shedding tears in my dreams at midnight. How embarrassing! How embarrassing!